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SEPTEMBER 7, 2010: Demands for Retraction of Proposed Amendment to Press And Journalists Act

Thirty-One IFEX Members And Global Partners Demand
Retraction of Proposed Amendment to Press And Journalists Act

SOURCE: International Freedom of
Expression Exchange Clearing House

In a letter to the President, IFEX members and four other
organisations called on the government to withdraw the proposed
amendment and revise other existing laws related to free expression:

President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni

State House,

Entebbe, Uganda

On behalf of the undersigned freedom of expression and human rights
organizations, we would like to express our serious concerns about the
proposed amendment to the Press and Journalist Act, which we understand
could be presented to the Parliament of Uganda in the near future.

If the Bill is passed as drafted it would restrict freedom of
expression in Uganda and impede the ability of journalists and media
outlets to fulfill their important roles by imposing unnecessarily
onerous registration and licensing requirements on the printed media.

Under your leadership Uganda has made tremendous strides in enjoyment
of press freedom. The decision to enshrine the right to freedom of the
press and access to information in the Constitution was an important
recognition of the importance of free media and freedom of expression in
a democracy. Indeed, the Ugandan media have thrived under your
government, scrutinizing public affairs, encouraging robust public
debate, and exposing corruption and other forms of malfeasance. In that
regard until recently Uganda was often cited as a good example of a
vibrant media landscape in the region. The proposed Bill threatens to
undo all this.

Requiring the annual licensing of newspapers by the Media Council
puts undue burden on the profession and on the industry, thereby
restricting the public's broader right to freedom of expression and
access to information. The proposed mandate for the Council to register
and license newspapers annually based on a conditional regime is most
disturbing. Whereas we would not object to a simple registration process
for the purpose of tracking newspapers in the country, we strongly
object to licensing of newspapers. This step would create an unnecessary
administrative burden and would expand the potential for political bias
that already exists by the required annual licensing of journalists
under the current Press and Journalist Act.

Taken with the new proposals, Uganda's legal regime would violate the
basic principles of freedom of expression. It would amount to licensing
the very freedoms that are guaranteed not only by Article 29 of the
Ugandan Constitution, but as well as in international instruments such
as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 19), the
International Covenant on Civil and Political rights (Article 19), to
which Uganda is a party. The proposed provisions also violate principle
VIII of the Declaration of Principles on Freedom of Expression in
Africa, which provides that any registration (not licensing) system for
the print media shall not impose substantive restrictions on the right
to freedom of expression. It also violates Article 9 of the African
Charter on Human and Peoples Rights.

In Latin America, imposing a license on the media has been a subject
of litigation, with the Inter-American Court for Human Rights
pronouncing licensing a violation of the fundamental right to receive
and impart information.

The proposed amendments also give the Media Council sweeping powers
to deny licenses to newspapers that are deemed to undermine "national
security, stability, or unity," Uganda's foreign relations, and the
country's economy. These are contestable constructs that would have to
be defined clearly and narrowly if they are to pass the constitutional
test for imposing limitations on right to freedom of expression. Giving
the Media Council the absolute discretion to define those terms as a
condition for renewal of a license or as a basis for penal action would
make the regulator an absolute determinant of what should constitute
media content. It amounts to a "substantive restriction" on freedom of
expression.

Moreover, the proposed amendments seek to give the Minister of
Information more control over the Media Council through appointments and
policy directions. This would erode any credibility the Council enjoyed
as a regulator.

Defining the technical standards for the production of news as the
amendment bill proposes, amounts to excessive veering into the media
industry by the government. The essence of newspapers has always been
their content, not their technical standards. Press freedom cannot be
the preserve of only those with "adequate technical standards".

Your Excellency, as you will recall, newspapers such as Munnansi and
the Citizen played a very influential role in the 1980s for exposing
violations of human rights. They were published on rudimentary
technology and had there been a requirement then for "adequate technical
facilities" they would never have seen the light of day.

We would also like to remind Your Excellency that several existing
laws - the Electronic Media Act, the Press and Journalist Act, the
Anti-Terrorism Law, and the Police Act - already contradict the
government's expressed commitments to free expression. We respectfully
request that you re-examine whether these laws should remain on the
books.

Reports by human rights organizations including Freedom House, Human
Rights Watch and the Committee to Protect Journalists, among others,
show that a worrying decline in press freedom in Uganda over the past
five years has been accompanied by a rise in self-censorship and attacks
on journalists. We respectfully ask Your Excellency to take steps to
address these issues and lead the way in protecting and promoting the
essential human right to freedom of expression by ensuring the
journalists are able to freely practice their profession. A first step
would be to withdraw the proposed amendment to the Press and Journalist
Act, followed by revisions of the existing laws to bring them into
conformity with the Ugandan Constitution and international standards.

We are confident that you and your government will give due diligence
to the protection of the right to free expression and a free press. We
respectfully request that you retract the amendment to the Press and
Journalist Bill as a signal of your commitment to free and fair
elections and to fundamental human rights.